TOPIC: WISDOM NEEDED! 12 hours to decide to push my exam? SH vs PM PrepCast issues

I have really enjoyed the PM PrepCast and have learned a lot.

My avg 1st time is mid to upper 70's and I feel like I am peaking at the right time. Retaking quizzes - scoring 70-90. I felt confident in concepts although I can't remember all the inputs and T/T.

I reviewed the DM videos online that everyone raves about. I am doing well on those - missed 5-10 over 100 questions. I stopped the video bc I felt like they were not challenging and I needed to use my time more effectively.

I then did something perhaps I shouldn't have done - I purchased SH. I thought this was a good option bc it would allow me to preview the much discussed unclear verbiage of the PMP. So far, it has been depressing and discouraging. There are some nice things about the program, but I feel like their program does not align with PM Prepcast. I see questions that are similar in concept but have a different answer. Some of their answers are just wrong, and their explanations are not helpful. But, as PMI writes the test, I feel torn with just 'learning their answer' vs what I have learned here.

I have taken 7 quizzes on SH. Most of them are around 70%. I have most of the easy-mod questions correct, and then miss some difficult and a few expert. I probably won't have time to get all of the test questions done, and I am not sure if that is something I should try given my confusion with the pre-tests.

I have 12 hours to reschedule my exam. Anyone have pearls of wisdom on this?

Thank you!!

Hi EM07,
Only you can know what’s right for you, but what you describe sounds very familiar. My short answer is: don’t postpone, you sound ready.
I also found PMI’s Study Hall demoralizing after having consistently done well using the PM Prepcast quizzes and Exam Simulator. But I knew I’d prepared well and had solid experience as a foundation.
On exam day, I encountered a similarly unnerving vagueness in the real exam questions to that found in SH. Despite that, I achieved a good AT/AT/AT on that first attempt.
There is something frustrating about feeling so unsure of how one’s doing during the exam and then getting a very good result, but I know I’m not alone in having that experience. Unless there’s a compelling reason to believe you’d reach a significantly higher peak during the time a postponement would provide, seize the opportunity to take the exam sooner rather than later.

EMO7:

If it were me, I'd take the test. Either you will pass (yeah!) or you will learn valuable things in the process. Either way, you gain something from it. You're going to gain anything by rescheduling your exam and then wringing your hands over it.

My 2-cents only there. There comes a point where you just get sick of studying. I think you're there or very close to it.

Harry

Dominic,

First of all , Congratulations on your ATx3l That is an amazing accomplishment!

Thank you so much for responding, especially since you have experienced this trying scenario.

I have rationalized the same as you - if I postpone how am I going to be better prepared in a few weeks than now? My main issue is feeling better prepared with the the vagueness in PMI's questions - either in SH or on the test.

I only have a few more days to prepare- from your experience, is my time better served in SH and trying to become desensitized to their vagueness and line of thought (if that is possible)? Or is it better to stick with what I know on PM PrepCast?

Thanks so much!

Hi Harry!

Thank you for reaching out!

I don't think your assessment is too far off. I don't mind studying - I fear failure.

So if studying 3 more weeks keeps me from failure - I will keep up my pace (2-3 hours per night) diligently.

I just don't know what else to do to put myself closer to passing. I thought SH would give me some experience with wording, but I never expected for their questions to not align with Prepcast or cause me to question "what I knew."

Thanks again Harry.

Thank you, EM07; much appreciated.
You're asking all the right questions. I wish I had the knowledge and wisdom to provide a properly useful reply.

I'll admit that I was so discouraged by my experiences with SH that I didn't spend any more time on it after the initial hours I'd spent exploring the platform and doing some quizzes. A waste of my money, perhaps, but -- like you -- I was keen not to waste the remaining time.

If it's just a matter of days before the exam, and if it were me doing this again, I'd concentrate first and foremost on getting as much good quality sleep and nutrition as possible. Making sure one is fresh and in one's best form for the endurance test that is the PMP exam is probably* more important than any new knowledge one might acquire in the final few days. From your posts, it sounds like you've done all the hard work already and just need to maintain your peak. (*But hey, don't let trying to achieve that become a source of stress either. If you don't manage to sleep well the night before the exam, neither did I.)
I'd then carry on studying my notes (made from the PMI texts and PM PrepCast), go over vocabulary/glossary definitions, and try to actively fill in gaps in any areas that I felt warranted the time.

If I'd spent more time on SH, might I have become more attuned to the form of the questions and become more comfortable with the style? I honestly doubt it. Would I have continued to feel disheartened by lower-than-expected results on SH? Definitely. And that's no use to anyone in the final run-up to an exam.
As an aside, in both SH and the exam that I took, there were some poorly worded questions/possible solutions that clearly hadn't been proofread. Some even read like they'd been written by a person or whole group with a very poor grasp of English. Bizarre. There's nothing that we can do about that, but going into the exam with that knowledge means you don't necessarily doubt yourself when a question makes no sense. Instead you can start problem-solving quicker to work out what they were trying to write.

Anyway, embrace the challenge of the exam. No one enjoys it (surely?!) but it's a great learning experience, whatever happens. Please do come back on here after you get your results to share how you found it all.

EM07,

Have you taken any of the PM Prepcast Exam Simulators? You mentioned taking quizzes, but I'd strongly encourage you to go through full length exams from PM Prepcast. If you've done them, and you're scoring in your 70s then you should be ready. The PMI Study Hall is a nice bonus to familiarize yourself with the vagueness, but I would not use the score from the SH to assess whether I'm ready or not for the PMP exam. From experience, I can tell you I did very poorly in the SH exam simulator (around 64%), but since I did well in the Prepcast Exam Simulators, I felt confident going into the exam. Since you mentioned you fear failure, I will say that you probably will never feel like you are ready to take the exam. I would say go for it, you don't need to be perfect. Wish you all the best, you can do this!

Regards,

Hi Daniel! Thanks for the follow up. I have not done an entire exam, but I have completed all 2200 of the questions. I have completed 180 in one night - I would just do smaller chunks so that I could learn as I went. I learn more effectively in smaller chunks.

The benefit of going through a full exam is that it builds your stamina for the final exam, but if you went through all 2200 questions, then that's probably way more than what you need to feel ready. Follow your intuition.

Dominic,

I think your response was very useful. I have 2 full days and a few hours the day of my test. I have cleared my weekend schedule as much as possible so really hoping to get that confidence back that I had pre-SH.

The sleep and nutrition is a great call out - I will do my best. LOL

Hello everyone,

Just a quick note that say that I was successful in passing the PMP exam. Very blessed and grateful to have accomplished this milestone. Thank you for all of this support.

Best of luck to those still on the PMP journey.

Ah, that's excellent news, EM07! Well done. You must feel very satisfied and relieved.
Make the most of it. And if there are things that you found particularly useful (or not!) in getting you to this point, your insight and feedback will always be useful to others on this Forum.